CHAPTER 26
I felt like living wasteland. A failed attempt to make the perfect citizen out of me and not even this imperfect society wanted me anymore.
Beaten up, broken and left for some underground rats to meal on my bruised body. They had left me. Left me with my pain and lonesomeness. Maybe I was too greedy after all, maybe money was the one thing that brought me down. No, it was carelessness and my own stupidity. You could guess three times what I did wrong; the answer was just too obvious. I grew to trust the wrong people. I had always been famous for making the wrong decisions and getting in between the worst company found in this whole universe. It all started when I was fourteen and found myself tagging along some junkies. I thought they were my friends, when the only thing they’d ever wanted from me was to stay on guard and see if the cops weren’t close and so they could smoke some pot. Their only friend was the intoxicating joint.
I broke loose of those people when I turned sixteen. For two miserable years I had been their trustful companion and the worst of it all- I didn’t even know why did I tag along. I guess I was just this outsider seeking for some people to call friends. Pathetic, I know. Where was my mind? Probably high from the cloud of smoke that always escorted me through mine and their worst times. And if some junkies as friends wasn’t bad enough, the next period of my life was when I got caught up with killers and that was the time when I became one. I was kicked out of school. I was more of a visitor there than a scholar. My folks were very disappointed with me. I think my mom is still angry, and if she could see me in the state I was in right now, she would scold me for being too fucking careless. No, she didn’t know what I did for living; she thought I was a photographer. Funny, I had never even laid a finger on a camera in my whole life and even now I didn’t regret I choose this as my temporary job, my temporary insanity. I was the devil’s daughter, coming straight from hell.
"Yeah, straight from hell my ass…" I tried to boost myself up from the concrete floor. Without any success, of course. At least I wasn’t tied to the chair anymore. It was really uncomfortable. Michelle had grown bored of beating only my face so they untied me. I was experiencing something that was too grand to call it pain anymore. It would be a disagreement from both mine and my body's side to tell it was just mere pain which pulsated throughout my body. I was in agony. My face was twice its normal size, I couldn’t open my left eye and there was something warm rolling down my face. Maybe even a chunk of the skin from my eyebrow. Fantastic. I could go to Halloween not wearing any costume or make-up. My side hurt, I was certain I had a couple of broken ribs and maybe even an inner bleeding.
I was sick and partly deaf. I didn’t know why was that though, but everything around me were just muffled noises. Okay, stop messing around, Morrison. It’s time to get up. But mom, five more minutes. Five more minutes and you’ll be dead. That convinced me. I didn’t want to die. I was too beautiful even with my swollen face.
My palms laid in something wet and sticky and I had absolutely no strength in my upper arms. Come on, you can do this. Easy for you to say, you’re not the one who has broken bones! Oh god how miserable I was. Somebody had to videotape this view and then show it back to me when everything would be healed, I’d laugh at myself. I’d explode in laughter. The only thing I managed to do was roll over and fall on my back painfully. Like a turtle which had a panic attack of not being able to get back on its fours. And now I could hear things. Even the annoying birds. So it seemed I was lying in a blood puddle, I was lying in my own blood. How ironic. A murderer ends up drowning in his/her blood.
"Fuck…" Someone exclaimed. Oh I wouldn’t come here if I was you. I’m not tied up, I’m beaten to a point where I can’t feel my legs, don’t ask, but hell I can kick. No, you can’t. Shush, I’m trying to stay alive, inner voice. Ah, okay, keep the good job up. Gentle fingers wrapped around my upper arm, pulling me up like I was some sort of a doll. I winced in pain. "Come on, you can do this…"
"You all… suck…" I coughed, and guess what, I coughed some blood. Yes, always wanted to do this, in movies it looked so cool, but now it felt like somebody was rubbing my insides with sand paper. Gently.
"You look like shit…" My arm was put around one’s neck. I felt something pointy jabbing my arm. A familiar shaggy head. I didn’t even try to look at him. Finally the exorcist came. It was a wonder I was still conscious and breathing. I guess I was just invincible. His arm wrapped around my waist and I cried out when he touched my rib.
"You can’t kill me…" It was hard to talk, but even my sore throat and aching insides couldn’t stop my babbling. He was pulling me somewhere and I was surprised of how my legs managed to move in somewhat synchronic movement. "I’m hulk…"
"Last time I checked you weren’t green… Maybe just between your legs." If I wasn’t balancing between agony and complete insanity, I would’ve hit him. Punched him right across the face. How dared he make fun of me in my last minutes? My arm was slipping from his shoulders, but he caught it in the last minute, lacing his fingers with mine in such a gentle way I could almost call it friendly.
"Where are you…" My voice broke off. I was losing some frames of the picture; I remembered brightness, warmth and freshness. All in one. Was I in heaven? Please, somebody just pinch me or slap me across the face and tell me I was not in heaven. All my life I had been certain I’d go to hell, no. I wanted my pal Satan, he owed me at least an eternity in shooting stuffed bunnies for my shitty life. That’s the least he could do.
"Man, she looks… pooped," he lied me down on something that was softer than the glass littered floor in the warehouse. Was that a car… engine I heard? No, I was clearly going delusional. Soothing fingers tugged a strand of my blood soaked hair behind my ear.
"Look who’s talking…" I gasped for air, an air which didn’t reek of a dead rat.
"She’s alive!" Was that Maddox? I hadn’t seen him in that hell hole, so was he my savior? It was too hard to open my eyes and look the death right in the eye. My hand fell over the edge of the soft padding, hitting something that awfully reminded a rug. So I was in a car, and the ride was bumpy.
My head spun and my tummy was upset. Oh jeez, please don’t throw up, please, please don’t throw up.
"You’re such a bloody mess…" Duke’s deep voice whispered. I think it was his hand which was caressing my cheek, the one which didn’t make me scream for heaven on earth.
"And you’re such an idiot…" I grimaced, the ride was truly bumpy, "I hope you’re not saving me…" He didn’t answer, so he was. He did know he had just written his death sentence by doing this, right? "Where are you taking me?"
"Over the border of California. A place where Big T loses his power over you." Great, so now I was running. Something I had never done in my life.
"Why are you doing this?" My mouth was dry and I could only taste blood, blood everywhere, on my lips, on my tongue, probably all over my face. This turned out to be one bloody Friday.
"Because you’re a fucking pain in the ass…" He laughed. What was so funny? I knew I was not in my best shape at the moment, but it was not polite to laugh at beaten up people. "And I happen to like the pain."
"Can we switch? Cause it's suffocating me."